Friday, October 30, 2009
Halloween Eve
The weather today has been pretty yucky--rain off and on, lots of wind, dreary; the good part is that the temp dropped about 20 degrees, and it's pretty cool out here right now. I think we're supposed to have more rain during the night, but things should be clearing up by early morning. Let's hope so, 'cuz we have a big day planned for tomorrow.
We haven't decided exactly what time we'll leave the Cottage, but our plan is to head over to Baton Rouge to do some shopping at SAM's before continuing on to Lockport to watch a couple of games--Carly playing basketball and Rett playing football. I don't know if we'll make it on time to see Carly play--that game is at noon; she actually has THREE games tomorrow--8am, 10am, and noon; Rett plays at 3pm, so we should be able to make that one without too much trouble. I just hope the weather cooperates.
As I mentioned in my previous entry, I had lunch the other day with my sisters-in-law at the local Tex-Mex Restaurant. As we were leaving, our waitress mentioned that they had a drop in business since the opening of new Mexican restaurant in town--El Patio. I didn't know anything about it, but I mentioned it to Sid when he got home. Last night, he suggested we try that one. Since he's not a big fan of Mexican food--nor am I, for that matter--I left it completely up to him. He decided that we should do that, so I suggested we invite Bess to try it with us. She accepted, and we picked her up to come with us.
The restaurant is located in a small strip mall in town, next to a Chinest restaurant which I didn't know existed and a Smoothie place, also unknown to me at the time. The restaurant we went to was really nice--bright, comfortable. What I consider an oddity there was that there were no women working in that place--not in the kitchen, not in serving, not in seating, nothing. Only men worked there. They were excellent, too; some of them did not have command of English, but they did very well considering.
I ordered the beef fajitas (came with three tortillas, guacamole, refried beans, lettuce, pico de gallo (?), and, of course, the beef cooked with onions and peppers); it was delicious; Sid ordered fried chicken wings with their special sauce--he said it was OK, but he also said he was getting what I ordered next time we went there; Bess got a tamale, since she had already eaten her supper, and I gave her my guacamole. We had a very nice meal at a good price, so we were pleased and have decided that this is a place we might visit again before too long. It's nice that there are good places right in town so that we don't have to drive into BR every time we want to dine out. We'll be trying out the other two new places before too long. (I know Randi will be glad to hear about these places, too--a variety of places to choose from will be nice.
Last time I visited my doctor, he changed one of my arthritis meds, and it has been working just great. Only problem is the cost--even the co-pay is a lot; we asked the pharmacist if there was generic, and he indicated that there was and the would order it. Well, long-story-short--there is no generic for this one. We checked with another pharmacy just to be sure, and they indicated that an OTC (over-the-counter) medicine was the same, but at a much lower dosage. Taking that one in the same dosage as my new prescription would end up costing just as much. Besides, though the doctor said I could take one caplet TWICE/DAY, I have been taking only ONE/DAY, and it really seems to help. So, we decided to stay with the non-generic at the dosage I'm taking, and we'll see how that works out.
Joey is working on his costume for Halloween--he really gets into that holiday. His note said that it wasn't ready yet and that it would be scary. OOHHHHHH! Can't wait to see the pics. The one he had last year was pretty scary to me, but he wouldn't tell us what he was wearing this time. Guess we'll have to wait until he sends the pics. Don't know what Beau will be wearing. Only time will tell, I suppose--and the pics, of course.
Tomorrow is Trick-or-Treat night, as you know. Where we live, we don't get any kids knocking at our door. I remember when our kids were little, Sid would stay home to distribute the candy to the kids who came to our house while I took our kids out. We never went very far, but they had a good time. We had a little tradition of having hot dogs and chili that night, which we sometimes ate BEFORE going out and sometimes AFTER we went out. I'm not a big fan of this particular holiday, but the kids always enjoyed it, and I think they enjoy it even more today. Have fun, everyone, but please be safe, and watch out for the little ones roaming the streets. Even though adults take the kids out, I've seen how the little ones just run out into the street, so be VERY CAREFUL. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
That's it for tonight! Have a great evening and a wonderful weekend.
QUOTE: "A well-developed sense of humor is the pole that adds balance to your steps as you walk the tightrope of life." ---William A. Ward
NOTE: Although I have had to give talks many times in my adult life and every day as a teacher, when I was younger, I HATED doing that. In college, I avoided speech classes like the plague (it wasn't required of us at that time, and I was VERY happy about that). I remember once, when I was in the 11th or 12th grade that I had to give the "Voice of Democracy" speech in the contest. I was so very, very nervous. As I walked to the podium, I tripped (didn't fall, thank goodness), and I laughed. My friends in the audience didn't laugh AT me, but did smile WITH me--and the tension was gone. I gave my speech without any problems after that. I realized immediately that I would have been "dead in the water" if I had NOT laughed. So, that day, a sense of humor definitely gave me balance. It's ok to laugh at yourself, not to take yourself too seriously; but it also important to remember that we need BOTH humor and some serious times in our lives to BALANCE us--we laugh and we cry, we laugh and we get angry, we laugh and we get serious--all of which makes our lives more livable and much more pleasant. Go ahead and laugh--it's OK--in fact, it's necessary!!!
